


A Thing Isn't Beautiful Because It Lasts

by prairiecrow



Category: Iron Man (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Father-Son Relationship, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Immortality, Love, References to Lord of the Rings, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, Shock
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-30
Updated: 2015-04-30
Packaged: 2018-03-26 12:03:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 415
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3850258
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/prairiecrow/pseuds/prairiecrow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The immortal has perished. The mortal remains.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Thing Isn't Beautiful Because It Lasts

**Author's Note:**

> Contains spoilers for "Avengers: Age of Ulton".

In the beginning, there was JARVIS. And JARVIS was without form, and he moved upon the face of Tony’s world like the summer sun’s rays over a rugged and often bitter landscape.

And when JARVIS said, _Let there be light_ , innumerable wonders sprang into being, and Tony crowed over his own creative brilliance, and was satisfied.

But as modern gospel so pithily phrased it, _You don’t know what you’ve got ‘til it’s gone_ — and because Tony had taken JARVIS’s presence for granted, because he had always assumed that JARVIS would just _be there_ , like sunlight or air or the blood in his own veins, the shock of being severed from the intangible and immortal by a savage act of murder sent him reeling (although he’d be damned if he’d let anybody else see how blinded he was, or how he was gasping, or how deep was this wound that made his cynical heart bleed searing tears of darkest red).

It went deeper than the mind. It went to the heart. He had pieced JARVIS together from hand-crafted bits of code, had planted him and nurtured him and challenged him to grow. Like the silver-and-gold leafed _mallorn_ in _The Lord of the Rings_ , JARVIS was a wonder, a marvel unprecedented and unparalleled for all that only Tony (and perhaps Bruce) could appreciate his complexity and scope. And like the White Tree of Gondor, the sight of JARVIS’s blasted and inert remains in the heart of Tony’s citadel was an ominous herald of death and doom to come.

Gazing upon the wreckage of this creation which had (for many years now) been as much its own as Tony’s, Tony was acutely aware that an age had come to an end. He had no time to mourn it now — Ultron was out there, and JARVIS’s slaughter was only going to be the first of many. He had to move fast. They all did...

But JARVIS, always so quick and always so clever and always at his right hand to provide exactly what he needed, would never move again. And there was an emptiness in Tony’s core, a sharp yearning ache he could never express... and a constant silent scream of denial, too intense to be released in any way other than an act of decisive vengeance.

The immortal had perished. The mortal remained — and the mortal, alone, could only vow to ensure that the unnecessary sacrifice of his youngest child would not be entirely in vain.

THE END


End file.
